Numbers
Chapter 17
1 God spoke to Moses, saying,
2 Talk to the people of Israel, and get a stick from each one based on their family leader’s house, making twelve sticks in total: write each man’s name on his stick.
3 Write Aaron’s name on Levi’s staff, because one staff represents the leader of their family.
4 Put them in the meeting tent in front of the covenant, where I will meet you.
5 The man’s stick I pick will flower, and I will stop the complaints of the Israelites against you.
6 Moses spoke to the Israelites, and each chief gave him a stick, one for each chief from their family groups, making twelve sticks total, including Aaron’s stick among them.
7 Moses put the rods in front of God in the tent of meeting.
8 The next day, Moses entered the tent of testimony and saw that Aaron’s staff for the Levi family had sprouted, produced buds, flowered, and grown almonds.
9 Moses brought all the rods from God to the Israelites, and they saw and each man took his own rod.
10 God told Moses, “Bring Aaron’s staff back before the testimony to be saved as a sign for the rebels; and you will completely remove their complaints from me, so they do not die.”
11 Moses did exactly what God told him to do.
12 The Israelites said to Moses, “Look, we’re going to die, we’re all going to die.”
13 Anyone who comes close to God’s tent will die: are we going to keep dying?